Rookie's goal: Make Chargers say, 'We've got to keep this guy'

MARTIN WISHES LEAF 'NOTHING BUT BEST'

Wide receiver Charly Martin already was familiar with a bit of Chargers history long before he signed with the team as a free agent out of West Texas A&M.

The quarterbacks coach at West Texas for all but three games the past three seasons: Ryan Leaf.

Martin said Leaf was candid about mistakes he made during his tumultuous four-year NFL career after being drafted No. 2 overall by the Chargers in 1998.

“The first thing he did when he got there, he talked about what he did,” Martin recalled. “He said, 'I was young. I had millions of dollars. I was stupid. I made mistakes.' He was a different person and just wanted to get back into the game.”

Leaf's post-NFL career has also been rocky. He has been indicted on drug and burglary charges in Randall County, Texas, as part of a grand jury investigation into his use of prescription medication.

“Anything that happens with Ryan will get overblown a little bit just because of what he did (in the NFL),” Martin said. “That's the path he's drawn, the life he's lived.”

During Leaf's tenure at West Texas A&M, the Buffaloes developed a high-powered passing attack. One quarterback, Dalton Bell, spent time on three NFL practice squads. Another quarterback, Keith Null, was a sixth-round draft pick by St. Louis this year.

“Now is that a coincidence?” Martin said. “I don't know. But I think Ryan's doing good now. I wish him nothing but the best. I'm not sticking up for anything he did, by any means. But I believe in second chances.”

He's a 25-year-old rookie free agent wide receiver out of Division II West Texas A&M. A guy who admits the odds against him are long. A guy who happily signed for a $5,000 bonus because all he wants is a chance to prove he can play at the next level.

Said Martin, “I'm going to put a team in a situation where they're like, 'We've got to keep this guy.'”

Martin has proven the skeptics wrong before.

Like when he came out of Framington (N.M.) High and said he'd play college football. Friends didn't laugh in his face, but eyes rolled.

The rap then?

“Kind of the whole, 'You're white. You're slow,'” Martin said.

He took his $500 books scholarship – the only offer he received – headed to West Texas A&M and proceeded to set school records for catches, receiving yards and touchdown receptions.

His numbers as a senior last year were pinball-esque: 95 catches, 1,867 yards and 22 TDs.

No one, of course, confuses the Lone Star Conference (Texas A&M-Commerce?) with the SEC. Take West Texas' playoff game last year against Abilene Christian when Martin's side put 68 points on the board.

Dig into Martin's past and you'll be regaled with stories about the 6-foot-1, 210-pound receiver's hunger for the game.

“Hardest worker I ever had,” said Framington High offensive coordinator Frank Whalen, now in his 19th season of coaching. “Last guy to leave the weight room and last guy to leave the field.”

West Texas receivers coach Mike Nesbitt tells the tale of Martin dressing for a road game, but being strictly told to keep to the sidelines for warmups and the game. Martin, who redshirted one season and was granted a medical redshirt in another, was recovering from a torn labrum.

“I'm not paying attention,” recalls Nesbitt. “I turn around and Charly's out there in pregame, taking reps with the first team, running and catching the ball. The head coach says to me, 'If you don't get the helmet away from that guy, you're not going to have a job anymore.”

Said Martin, who punctuates sentences with yes-sir and no-sir, “I felt kind of bad.”

While the odds of making an NFL roster as a free agent are long, they're hardly astronomical. The Chargers' roster is loaded with free-agent finds – Jacques Cesaire, Stephen Cooper, David Binn, Kassim Osgood, to name a few – topped by Pro Bowl tight end Antonio Gates.

Last year's NFL Defense Player of the Year, Steelers linebacker James Harrison, was a free agent.

At wide receiver, Wes Welker is the free-agent poster child. The Chargers signed him out of Texas Tech in 2004, cut him after one game, the Dolphins picked him up and now he's Tom Brady's security blanket at New England.

As you'd expect from a player who's three units shy of earning a master's in sports business, Martin did his homework when prepping for the NFL.

He signed with the Chargers partly because the team's top three wide receivers (Vincent Jackson, Chris Chambers and Malcom Floyd) are scheduled to be free agents next season. And because he knew his chances of making an NFL roster depended on his ability to play special teams, he nagged the West Texas coaches into letting him see some action there last season.

“I had to beg just to get me a few (plays) because I knew I needed film for the NFL,” Martin said.

In the second game of the season at Central Oklahoma, Martin burst through the middle of the line, blocked a punt and recovered it in the end zone for a touchdown.

“When he was born, somebody touched him and said, 'You are built to be a football player,'” said Nesbitt.

For Saturday's preseason opener against Seattle, Martin said he's slated to return kickoffs and play the outside gunner position on the punt team.

While many fans grumble about paying regular-season prices for preseason football, Martin's view is understandably different.

Leaning against his locker at Chargers Park, Martin broke into a smile, then said of the Seahawks game, “It's my Super Bowl. It's the biggest game I've played in my life.”